MiSTer FPGA Forum

Okay, this is really silly, but something that I've been missing from my first contact with the MiSTer, so I might as well share it.

I love floppy (or even hard) drives sounds. They tell me if something is going as expected or wrong. They are reassuring.

I wanted to know how feasible and if it were one day a possibility to have, as an option, floppy drive sounds reproduced in the MiSTer in the same way as they are in some software emulators.

I have started work on interfacing real floppy drives for this very reason. For the most part it works well with Amiga, a bit hit and miss on Atari ST. Will look probably at ao486 next. I need to get the adapter board finished.

Definitely not something I think a lot of people care about so not sure it'll make it to mainline MiSTer but happy to post my progress.

retrorepair wrote: ↑Mon Jun 15, 2020 10:41 am Will look probably at ao486 next. I need to get the adapter board finished.

If you manage this it would really be great, it is also just a bit of nostalgia I miss also.

I responded in another thread about this, but I would really like that as well.

i'm fine with it as long as it is not enabled by default

Floppy sounds add some "real feel" to the whole experience so I think it would be a nice idea. I don´t know if they are hard to implement though.

The drive "tick" on the amiga is what makes it singularly unique.. and its the soul of the machine (IMHO) .. so I love hearing that.. but I wholly agree with the "lets you know somethings working --- or not" aspect.

And maybe one of the MiSTer leds could blink to simulate the drive led.

lomdar67 wrote: ↑Wed Jun 17, 2020 5:48 am And maybe one of the MiSTer leds could blink to simulate the drive led.

That usually is already the case. Though not always super accurately yet, from what I remember.

Indeed, it does that, which is quite helpful in certain cores, like the Amiga one.

Apparently that is already implemented, but in a fork of the Amiga core ?
See : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rgUl5Vll5vo

Would be nice if this support was brought to mainline.

LamerDeluxe wrote: ↑Wed Jun 17, 2020 7:22 am

lomdar67 wrote: ↑Wed Jun 17, 2020 5:48 am And maybe one of the MiSTer leds could blink to simulate the drive led.

That usually is already the case. Though not always super accurately yet, from what I remember.

Not really. It flashes when DMA is accessed and can, in some cases, flash the LED when the drive is doing nothing.

I think the motor_on signal should activate the drive LED as with the original hardware. I know Sorg doesn't agree though so not sure if a PR will be much use.

mahen wrote: ↑Wed Jun 17, 2020 10:56 am Apparently that is already implemented, but in a fork of the Amiga core ?
See : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rgUl5Vll5vo

Would be nice if this support was brought to mainline.

It seems this one sends the floppy sound to a buzzer or something? Although that would rock my world, I don't have the skills to plug that and a brutal simple floppy sound emulation in the back of the normal channels would be awesome already ;D

I have Antonio Villena's kit (case + io board) that includes this speaker. I'm gonna give it a try and tell you if that's worth it !

The source of the fork is here:

https://github.com/Miguel-T80c/Minimig-AGA_MiSTer

Is this not a bit like requesting Mister plays the old internet dial up sounds every time you connect it to the wifi, or am I missing something?

Moondandy wrote: ↑Wed Jun 17, 2020 1:26 pm Is this not a bit like requesting Mister plays the old internet dial up sounds every time you connect it to the wifi, or am I missing something?

Haha, it's pretty much the same thing, but for some, floppy drive sounds are intrinsic to the retro computing experience (especially on the Amiga).

It's a little bit like playing a record on a turntable. It has something nostalgic.

You are missing something. If done correctly, it is helpful in that it can tell when some games are stuck for one reason or another, without having to stare 3 minutes at a screen hoping for the best to happen.

LeftEmpty wrote: ↑Wed Jun 17, 2020 2:31 pm You are missing something. If done correctly, it is helpful in that it can tell when some games are stuck for one reason or another, without having to stare 3 minutes at a screen hoping for the best to happen.

But only if it is really an accurate emulation of the read and write commands. And an accurately blinking led would do the same trick.

LeftEmpty wrote: ↑Wed Jun 17, 2020 2:31 pm If done correctly, it is helpful in that it can tell when some games are stuck for one reason or another, without having to stare 3 minutes at a screen hoping for the best to happen.

That is true. The drive sounds give a more accurate representation of what the drive is doing than the drive LED that most of the time is just on. I assume that is why WinUAE displays a sector (?) read number in addition on the drive activity LEDs.

On real Amigas you can hear at once if the game is loading fine or not.

Audio feedback from the drive was really important back on actual hardware, I miss it on MiSTer more than I thought I would especially for Amiga & C64.

OK so I gave it a try yesterday (Amiga core, "db9 fork"). It does work and that's quite useful, although the implementation is quite minimalist ATM : you can just hear when tracks are being loaded, but you don't hear : disk insertion, motor sound, "clicks" when waiting for a disk, reading errors, or the sound when you eject a disk while it's being accessed At least it's there !

I agree that the floppy drive sounds are certainly a part of the experience. The Gotek floppy emulator has the ability to add a speaker for these sounds when used with vintage computers (such as the Amiga, ST, etc) and not only is it a nostalgic thing but is actually useful for audible load indications.

I remember way back when there were actually programs for the Commodore 64 that made the disk drive "play songs" using the drive heads. Probably terrible for the drive, but it was pretty cool at the time The C64 Ultimate FPGA device does very well at re-creating these sounds and those demos can be accurately simulated as well.

If implemented I do agree it should be something that is user enabled/disabled as I can see some people would not care for it.

eightbit wrote: ↑Fri Jun 19, 2020 4:10 am Probably terrible for the drive, but it was pretty cool at the time

Oh it was indeed very bad for the c64/1541 disk drives more so the older units .. one run could easily whack them out of alignment..

lomdar67 wrote: ↑Wed Jun 17, 2020 2:37 pm

LeftEmpty wrote: ↑Wed Jun 17, 2020 2:31 pm You are missing something. If done correctly, it is helpful in that it can tell when some games are stuck for one reason or another, without having to stare 3 minutes at a screen hoping for the best to happen.

But only if it is really an accurate emulation of the read and write commands. And an accurately blinking led would do the same trick.

You only need the motor control signals which are all present (and correct) in the Minimig core at least.

Read and write commands are irrelevant for our purposes.

Here's the minimig core interacting directly over user i/o with an A500 floppy drive:

https://t.co/Mw51YN6VCh

Wrong video: https://twitter.com/whybrow_joel/status ... 34208?s=19

I like the idea in general but it'd have to be really spot on/subtle. I had it enabled on Gotek once and that implementation was actually terrible, very distracting.

akeley wrote: ↑Fri Jun 26, 2020 4:53 pm I like the idea in general but it'd have to be really spot on/subtle. I had it enabled on Gotek once and that implementation was actually terrible, very distracting.

I think the buzzer sounds pretty bad myself but it's better than a large floppy drive for a lot of people.

I may have an alternative in the works however.

@retrorepair : an alternative with a different hardware part or mixed in the audio stream ? Cheers I feel the current Amiga implementation with the buzzer is quite OK and it is clearly useful, but it could indeed be better